


- And in Death He Lives

by QueerLeFay



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Drabble, M/M, Rebirth, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-04
Updated: 2016-06-04
Packaged: 2018-07-12 03:06:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7082641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueerLeFay/pseuds/QueerLeFay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“What you have to remember is that life and death are different sides of the same coin” – Neil Gaiman (American Gods, p.523)</p>
            </blockquote>





	- And in Death He Lives

**Author's Note:**

> A completely self-indulgent work done in under an hour at 2 a.m.  
> Do not expect too much, and that is my warning.  
> Please forgive any grammar, structural, or typing mistakes. I have no excuses other than that I am still learning the ways of writing.

Death muted the colours, but it did nothing to his memory. He can still see the familiar blue and the brilliant gold of the eyes he had last seen before his heart failed him, and he held on to the vibrancy of them. At times, as he stood untouched by time, they were the only things rooting him in place. 

Once a year, when the day was shortest, he caught a glimpse of the mockery of his memory. 

And at the other side and for the other man – 

The other man was untouched by death, protected as he was in a shroud of timelessness. And he felt, too, that death no longer made him jealous as it took the happiness he kept close to his chest away and out of his reaches.

But of course that is one of the million lies he had accumulated through time.

There is no doubt that Fate has a twisted sense of humour, for it kept the man who shone the brightest under the virility of life in the dullness of the veil and it forced the man who felt most at home in the shadows under the bright sun.

\---

He floated through space, not heeding the living except for the counterpart of his heart, the only person reminding him that he was once there, too – there, where everything seemed so brilliant.

He mourned for the other man’s inability to break the chains of his beating heart. He mourned for the way he kept on living, and he mourned for the combination of restlessness and tiredness so palpable it even broke through the stillness of death. 

And still he waited, through the people slipping in and out next to him. He remained where he was until he was permitted out there again. 

And he hoped that Fate won’t play her tricks and exchanged his place with the other man’s. 

What a wonderful joke that would be.

What a wonderful… 

But he did not know him anymore, did he? So why would it matter? 

Maybe their lives, once interwoven, now paralleled each other – close, but never touching, never again.

How depressing is the word ‘never’ anyway?

And maybe his desire to live again, his want to exist next to him was from nothing more than a glorified memory.

Maybe it was just the thought of him that made him miss him so. Maybe they were not really that compatible and it was just the situation that made them so close. Maybe they just needed each other’s abilities and positions for their own gains. Maybe, maybe, maybe…

Maybe he was just insecure in the thought that he experienced nothing compared to the other man and while he still needed him so and he still missed him so and he still wanted him so, the need and the feeling and the want would not be reciprocated. Maybe he was already being reduced into a sliver of a memory of a fallen king from once upon a time.

And he was no longer needed. 

He did not know that death would bring about that much emotion. He felt cheated off his peaceful end.

\---

He emerged out of the coolness of the clear water, chest burning and in too much stimulation. He was not used to the feeling anymore, and he was afraid of how unfamiliar it felt. He no longer knew how to handle animation in his own body.

He jerked under the touch of a weary hand, fingers ghosting over the side of his face, down to his arms, catching his hand, weaving into the spaces between his fingers. He was almost afraid to look up. 

And he stared, wide-eyed, at the vibrancy of the blue of the eyes in front of him. How they looked the same as the ones preserved in his memory. He held his relieve, because he did not know him anymore and vice versa.

They were not the same people anymore; and while he was suspended in space, the man in front of him had learned new things, met new people, restructured his thoughts and beliefs.

He was looking at a stranger.

What a strange thought; to look at a person you knew so well, to look at a face so familiar, and felt so distanced at the same time, to no longer know who they were.

But he gripped on the hand settling in his all the same, eager to relearn, remap, rediscover, each other – to find out if they were indeed compatible and if he was not just idealizing the memory of them.

He gripped on tight and he chocked out a name he had savoured in his tongue ever since once upon a time.


End file.
